Search This Blog

PHILIPPINES : APEC delegates visit USC refinery

Delegates to an APEC meeting on intellectual property rights visited yesterday a bio-refinery plant in Cebu that processes waste from the dried mango industry.

“The plant is a showcase of an academic institution that has successfully generated added income and new jobs from its intellectual property asset,” the Intellectual Property Office of the Philippines (IPOPHL) said in a press statement.

The tour participants are in Cebu for the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation Intellectual Property Rights Experts’ Group (APEC-IPEG) meeting.

The plant they visited “repurposes the dried mango wastes for a variety of products such as mango flour, butter, and tea”, as well as ingredients like pectin and polyphenol for the cosmetics industry.

The University of San Carlos (USC) owns and operates the bio-refinery plant and is one of the partner universities of IPOPHL in its Innovation and Technology Support Office program.

“The USC plant is one of our ITSO success stories, which illustrates the very best of government and private sector partnership in the area of IP,” said lawyer Allan B. Gepty, deputy director general of IPOPHL and head of the Philippine IPEG delegation.

He hopes the visit will inspire “stronger policy support for IP commercialization for academic institutions.”

“Fostering SME participation in regional and global Markets” is one of the Philippines’ priorities as host of the APEC meetings this year.

Another APEC meeting that opened during the weekend in Cebu was that of the Experts Group on Illegal Logging and Associated Trade (EGILAT).

In his opening remarks last Saturday, Environment and Natural Resources Undersecretary Demetrio Ignacio pointed out that the country has taken steps to combat illegal logging and its associated trade.

“Since our President imposed a total log ban in all natural forests nationwide four years ago, we have been able to reduce illegal logging hotspots by almost 90 percent, as well as reforest more than one million hectares,”Ignacio said.

He said he looked forward to hearing some insights for eliminating the last 10 percent and preventing a recurrence of illegal logging in the Philippines.

Other APEC meetings in Cebu involved the Anti-Corruption and Transparency Working Group and the Sub-Committee on Customs and Procedures.

While "Flavor" is very subjective, and each country that grows mangoes is very nationalistic, these are the mango varieties that are the most sought after around the world because of sweetnesss (Brix) and demand.The Chaunsa has a Brix rating in the 22 degree level which is unheard of!Carabao claims to be the sweetest mango in the world and was able to register this in the Guiness book of world records.Perhaps it is time for a GLOBAL taste test ???

Mangaluru: Vagaries of nature is expected to take a toll on the production of King of Fruits - Mango - in Karnataka this year. A combination of failure of pre-monsoon showers at the flowering and growth stage and spike in temperature in mango growing belt of the state is expected to limit the total production of mango to an estimated 12 lakh tonnes in the current season as against 14 lakh tonnes in the last calendar year.

However, the good news for fruit lovers is that this could see price of mangoes across varieties decrease marginally by 2-3%. This is mainly on account of 'import' of the fruit from other mango-growing states in India, said M Kamalakshi Rajanna, chairperson, Karnataka State Mango Development and Marketing Corporation Ltd.

Karnataka is the third largest mango-growing state in India after Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra.

Inaugurating a two-day Vasanthotsava organized by Shivarama Karantha Pilikula Nisargadhama and the Corporation at P…